The subject matter disclosed herein generally relates to medical imaging systems, search methods within medical imaging systems and intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) imaging systems. In medical imaging in general, luminal structures of a living body can be visualized by using a medical imaging device that acquires a sequence of images. The sequence of images may include thousands of images about a specific part of the human anatomy. For clinical diagnosis, an operator may need to search the sequence of images to identify at least one image feature of interest. For example, an IVUS imaging system and catheter may be used by an interventional cardiologist to locate a minimum lumen area within a segment of an atherosclerotic-diseased coronary artery.
An IVUS system generally displays at least a single plane (tomographic) image of the coronary artery. The IVUS system may further display a longitudinal view of the coronary artery wherein the longitudinal view is a cut-plane of a sequence of tomographic images that are acquired as an IVUS catheter transducer is translated through the coronary artery. The image sequence may include many thousands of tomographic images depending on the imaging frame rate and translation rate of the sensor through the coronary artery.
Thus, with thousands of potential tomographic images to view, a need for a display technology that provides a more intuitive approach and rapid interaction for the operator to guide interventional cardiology procedures arises. Further, it is desirable that such a display technology reduce to time to identify at least one image feature of interest in a sequence of images.